1920s
| Year | Film | Director | Cast | Notes | Ref |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1920 | The Spiders | Fritz Lang | Restored in 1978 from a newly-discovered original print, 2nd of 2-part series. | ||
| 1920 | Der Wildtöter und Chingachgook | Arthur Wellin | Bela Lugosi | Recovered in the 1990s. | |
| 1920 | Genuine | Robert Wiene | Complete copy was discovered in the Berlin film archive. | ||
| 1920 | The Daughter of Dawn | Norbert Myles (writer) | White Parker, Wanada Parker, Esther LeBarre, Jack Sankadoty | Bought and restored by the Oklahoma Historical Society since 2007. | |
| 1920 | If I Were King | J. Gordon Edwards | William Farnum, Betty Ross Clarke, Fritz Leiber, Sr. | Print is held by the Library of Congress. | |
| 1920 | Algol | Emil Jannings | |||
| 1920 | In the Days of St. Patrick | Norman Whitten | |||
| 1920 | Within Our Gates | Oscar Micheaux | Found in Spain, translated as La Negra. | ||
| 1920 | Helen of Four Gates | Cecil Hepworth | Alma Taylor James Carew |
Found in a film vault in Quebec, Canada in 2008. | |
| 1921 | The Blue Fox | Duke Worne | |||
| 1921 | The Conquest of Canaan | Roy William Neill | Thomas Meighan, Doris Kenyon | Found in Russian state archives Gosfilmofond Moscow. Digital copy given to the Library of Congress in 2010. | |
| 1921 | The Devil | Ferenc Molnár | George Arliss | Was also made in 1918 in Hungary. American release is currently under restoration and schedule for re-release in 2011. | |
| 1921 | Der Tanz auf dem Vulkan | Richard Eichberg | Bela Lugosi | Found in a film archive in the 1990s, albeit in its American release version. | |
| 1921 | Hard Luck | Edward F. Cline Buster Keaton |
Buster Keaton | Long considered Keaton's major lost film until partially reconstructed in 1987. The climactic final scene was later recovered in a Russian archive. | |
| 1921 | Molly O' | F. Richard Jones | Mabel Normand | ||
| 1922 | Kick In | George Fitzmaurice | Betty Compson Bert Lytell |
Found in Russian state archives; Gosfilmofond (Moscow). Digital copy given to the Library of Congress in 2010. | |
| 1922 | Sherlock Holmes | Albert Parker | John Barrymore, Roland Young, William Powell | Film was restored over a thirty year period from the original camera negatives at the George Eastman House. | |
| 1922 | Beyond the Rocks | Sam Wood | Gloria Swanson, Rudolph Valentino | Donated by collector Joop Van Liempd (1913–2002) to Nederlands Filmmuseum and restored by them in 2005. | |
| 1922 | Little Red Riding Hood | One of the first theatrical animated cartoons from Walt Disney. Found in a London film library in 1998 and restored the same year. | |||
| 1922 | Phantom | F. W. Murnau | |||
| 1922 | The Young Rajah | Phil Rosen | Rudolph Valentino | A hodgepodge of surviving footage and still pictures allow only a peek into this very incomplete film. | |
| 1923 | The Call of the Canyon | Victor Fleming | Richard Dix | Found in Russian state archives; Gosfilmofond(Moscow). Digital copy given to the Library of Congress in 2010. | |
| 1923 | Canyon of the Fools | Val Paul | Found in Russian state archives; Gosfilmofond(Moscow). Digital copy given to the Library of Congress in 2010. | ||
| 1923 | Circus Days | Edward F. Cline | Jackie Coogan | Found in Russian state archives; Gosfilmofond (Moscow). Digital copy given to the Library of Congress in 2010. | |
| 1923 | Souls for Sale | Rupert Hughes | Eleanor Boardman | Discovered and restored in 2006 by Turner Classic Movies and MGM. | |
| 1923 | The Eternal Struggle | Reginald Barker | Renée Adorée | Found in Russian state archives; Gosfilmofond (Moscow). Digital copy given to the Library of Congress in 2010. | |
| 1923 | Maytime | Louis J. Gasnier | Clara Bow, Ethel Shannon, Harrison Ford | Found in the New Zealand Film Archive in 2009; undergoing restoration. | |
| 1923 | The White Shadow | Graham Cutts | Betty Compson Clive Brook Henry Victor A.B. Imeson |
Found in the New Zealand Film Archive in August 2011. | |
| 1924 | $20 A Week | Harmon F. Weight | |||
| 1924 | The Arab | Rex Ingram | Ramón Novarro, Alice Terry | Found in Russian state archives; Gosfilmofond (Moscow). Digital copy given to the Library of Congress in 2010. | |
| 1924 | Venus of the South Seas | Annette Kellerman | Restored by Library of Congress in 2004. Last reel of 55-minute film is in Prizmacolor. | ||
| 1924 | The Breaking Point | Herbert Brenon | |||
| 1924 | Empty Hearts | Alfred Santell | John Bowers, Clara Bow | ||
| 1924 | Pied Piper Malone | Alfred E. Green | Thomas Meighan, Lois Wilson | Discovered in a Russian film archive by historians Mark Tiedje and John Coles. It was screened in 2007 in Georgetown, South Carolina, where it was filmed. | |
| 1925 | Clash of the Wolves | Noel M. Smith | Rin Tin Tin, Charles Farrell, June Marlowe, Heinie Conklin | A 35mm projection print was uncovered in South Africa and repatriated to the United States. It underwent restoration and preservation in 2003. | |
| 1925 | Keep Smiling | Albert Austin, Gilbert Pratt | Monty Banks | Found in Russian state archives. Digital copy given to the Library of Congress in 2010. | |
| 1925 | The Lost World | Harry Hoyt | Bessie Love, Lewis Stone, Wallace Beery, Lloyd Hughes | Only 65 minutes abridged version existed until 1992, when Jan-Christopher Horak, formerly of George Eastman House, located a nearly full-length print at the Filmovy Archiv (Prague, Czech republic). | |
| 1926 | Bardelys the Magnificent | King Vidor | John Gilbert | Restored in 2008 from a nearly-complete print discovered in France in 1998. | |
| 1926 | The Bat | Roland West | Tullio Carminati | ||
| 1926 | The Boob | William Wellman | Joan Crawford, George K. Arthur | ||
| 1926 | Camille | Fred Niblo | Norma Talmadge | ||
| 1926 | Exquisite Sinner | Josef von Sternberg | Conrad Nagel, Renée Adorée, George K. Arthur, Myrna Loy | ||
| 1926 | The Flaming Frontier | Edward Sedgwick | Hoot Gibson, Dustin Farnum | ||
| 1926 | Mare Nostrum | Rex Ingram | Antonio Moreno, Alice Terry | ||
| 1926 | You Never Know Women | William Wellman | Florence Vidor, Lowell Sherman, Clive Brook, El Brendel | Never really a lost film, a copy has resided at the Library of Congress since the 1970s. | |
| 1926 | A Page of Madness | Teinosuke Kinugasa | Found by the director in his garden shed in 1970; he had buried it during World War II and forgotten it. | ||
| 1927 | Duck Soup | Fred Guiol | Laurel & Hardy | Thought lost until a copy surfaced in 1974. | |
| 1927 | Her Wild Oat | Marshall Neilan | Colleen Moore, Larry Kent, Hallam Cooley | Found by Hugh Neely in the Czech National Film Archive in Prague in 2001 and subsequently restored by the Academy Film Archive. | |
| 1927 | It | Clarence G. Badger | Clara Bow | Believed lost until a print surfaced in Prague in the 1960s. | |
| 1927 | The Magic Flame | Henry King | Ronald Colman, Vilma Bánky | ||
| 1927 | Mockery | Benjamin Christensen | Lon Chaney, Barbara Bedford, Ricardo Cortez | Rediscovered in the mid 1970s, it is available on DVD from Warner Bros. | |
| 1927 | Napoléon | Abel Gance | Never totally lost, but existing prints were once only half as long as the current restoration. | ||
| 1927 | The Ridin' Rowdy | Richard Thorpe | |||
| 1927 | The Rough Riders | Victor Fleming | Charles Farrell, Mary Astor, Noah Beery, George Bancroft | ||
| 1927 | Senorita | Alfred E. Green | Bebe Daniels | ||
| 1927 | Sorrell and Son | Herbert Brenon | H. B. Warner, Anna Q. Nilsson, Carmel Myers, Nils Asther, Louis Wolheim, Mary Nolan | ||
| 1927 | Tarzan and the Golden Lion | J. P. McGowan | James Pierce | Thought lost until a print was discovered in the closet of a French asylum in the 1990s. | |
| 1927 | Upstream | John Ford | Discovered in New Zealand in 2010 among 75 silent films being returned to the US, many of which were thought lost. | ||
| 1927 | Metropolis | Fritz Lang | Alfred Abel, Brigitte Helm | Never fully lost. The full 153-minute version was discovered in an Argentina film museum in 2008, though two scenes were too badly damaged to repair. However, the film itself is now about 99% complete. | |
| 1927 | Wings | William A. Wellman | Clara Bow, Charles 'Buddy' Rogers, Richard Arlen, Gary Cooper | Found in the Cinémathèque Française film archive in Paris. | |
| 1928 | The Constant Nymph | Adrian Brunel | Ivor Novello, Benita Hume | ||
| 1928 | Tillie's Punctured Romance | A. Edward Sutherland | W. C. Fields | ||
| 1928 | The Passion of Joan of Arc | Carl Theodor Dreyer | Although inferior prints existed, a nearly-pristine print was found in the janitor's closet of a Norwegian mental asylum. | ||
| 1928 | The Racket | Lewis Milestone | Thomas Meighan, Marie Prevost, Louis Wolheim | Produced by Howard Hughes, and discovered following his death in his private collection. | |
| 1928 | The Crimson City | Archie Mayo | Myrna Loy, Conrad Nagel, Anna May Wong | A complete print was discovered in Argentina in 2008. | |
| 1928 | The Spanking Age | Robert F. McGowan | An Our Gang film thought to be lost, but discovered in 1990. | ||
| 1928 | Two Arabian Knights | Lewis Milestone | Produced by Howard Hughes, and long thought lost until a print was found in his vault after his death. | ||
| 1928 | The Mating Call | James Cruze | Produced by Howard Hughes, and long thought lost until a print was found in his vault after his death. | ||
| 1929 | Drag | Frank Lloyd | |||
| 1929 | The Letter | Jean de Limur | Jeanne Eagels, O. P. Heggie, Reginald Owen, Herbert Marshall | ||
| 1929 | Why Be Good? | William Seiter | |||
| 1929 | Wonder of Women | Clarence Brown |
Read more about this topic: List Of Rediscovered Films, Silent Era